[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hello, everyone.
Welcome back to Rewadology.
Your rewilder host here, Brooke Mitchell. And today I'm bringing you an exciting update from Chilean Patagonia.
I was hoping to get this in between or so out sooner, but I just returned from an eight day excursion in Alaska and holy moly. If you've never been at Alaska to the top of your bucket list and. And if Patagonia is at the top of your adventure bucket list, we still have spaces available on our April 2026 Patagonia Puma and Trekking expedition.
You can learn more at the website or reach out to me with any questions. I'm here and happy to help.
Anyways, When I recorded my series where the Wild A Journey Through Patagonia's Route of Parks in April and May of 2024, I documented some remarkable conservation stories across Chile's 1700 mile wilderness corridor.
But conservation work is dynamic and in just over a year since that journey, there have been some extraordinary developments.
Today I'm joined by Cristian Salcedo, wildlife director for Rewilding Chile, who's been at the forefront of conservation efforts in Patagonia for nearly two years, decades.
What he's about to share represents some genuinely exciting breakthroughs, from discovering endangered species populations in unexpected places to pioneering international wildlife collaborations.
So let's dive into what's been happening in one of the most ambitious conservation projects on the planet.
[00:01:46] Speaker B: I'm Cristian Saucedo. I'm a veterinary doctor and I'm the conservation director, or the director in charge of the wildlife programs for Rewilding Chile for Fundacion Rewilding Chile in Chile, which.
[00:02:04] Speaker A: Is amazing and I am so excited to sit down with you, Christian, to give a great update episode.
So for everybody who's listened to where the Wild Calls A Journey Through Patagonia's Root of parks, that whole series, I recorded that in April, May of 2024. And so now you and I are sitting down in July 2025 and a lot has happened since then. Oh my goodness gracious, a lot of very exciting things.
So I would love to get into all of that and give the whole audience, our whole community, what you've all been discovering in the past year. But first, let's get to know you a little bit more. What is your backstory? How did you become the wildlife director and get to Rewilding Chile? Because you started in 2005, right? So you've been here for a while. What was, what inspired you?
[00:03:00] Speaker B: Yeah, well, first of all, I start to to study veterinarian because I was really.
My hope was to work for wildlife, with wildlife, for wildlife in nature. That was my dream. And the possibility that approached me to that was.
I first worked for the Chilean Park Service in the early 2000.
I started working there with one of the first projects to research and conserve threatened Wemul in Patagonia. So later on, a couple of years later I jumped from the Chilean Park Service.
I had an offer and a possibility to work with Doug and Chris Tompkins in the creation of the Patagonia national park process. So I was in charge or one of the members of the team in charge of the transition of a former sheep ranching farm to become a national park. So today that park is already created, is officially created, is managed by the Chilean Park Service and is still as Fundacion Rewild in Chile as a legacy of Tompkins conservation. We keep working in that area, supporting the Park Service work in the rewilding efforts with some keystone species of the area like Huemuldir, Andean condor, Darwin's Rhea, Pumas, guanacos and many other wildlife of the isle.
[00:04:46] Speaker A: How cool. So it was just a serendipitous meeting. It's so amazing because how many people I've talked to throughout Chile who just had this, just this again serendipitous meeting with Chris and Doug and then like their whole life trajectory changed by meeting these two people. Like you know, I sat down with Carolina and you and just these happenstance moments and now like look like how much impact you've done since then.
[00:05:17] Speaker B: Yeah, totally is impact not just at the personal or professional level but it's like with a much wider effect because it's like that you start building teams. That team had a local effect. So it's a kind of snowball today.
Much well understood what we are trying to accomplish. Promoting the creation of new national parks, promoting the responsible tourism, the development of local communities and the work with the, with the Chilean state in this case. So the public and private partnership to advance for conservation and for protection.
[00:06:05] Speaker A: Oh yeah, absolutely.
Again having the chance to talk with Carolina who really gave the like scoop and how in the beginning just how much you know, clashing and controversy in the very like in the 90s when this idea really started to take off with you know the Tompkins buying all the land and yeah all the conspiracies that were around them, it just go I having done so much research into that whole story like the amount of respect I have for them is just crazy. And the foresight that they had for all the land that's now been protected in Chile, the entire root of parks, how many millions of acres of land. It's just, it's such a fantastic story and not enough people around the world know it. They just don't. That was part of my motivation for recording the series that I did. It's like this is one of the most extraordinary stories in, I mean in so many different levels of philanthropy, of conservation, of rewilding, of wildlife protection, of like corridor of, you know, local community development. It's like so many different things and like so many people don't know about it yet. So I was like, everybody needs to know the story.
[00:07:20] Speaker B: Yeah, totally. This is why it's a good reason for people to travel to visit what we are doing in Patagonia, the beauty of a huge region of the Southern cone that includes also the Argentine part as well. We feel really, I think that as Chileans and even Argentinians, we are so lucky that Doug increased their personal life stories were connected with these two countries and they decide to promote these conservation projects, these rewilding projects in both countries and inspire a new generation of professional of teams and, and I think that is quite unique and super powerful and it makes a big difference in these two countries. How originally conservation was understood and how conservation is happening today. So there is no single way to do good conservation. There are many ways but I feel that they really inspire and inject all their experience from the vast the business world to the conservation. And that has been super important and inspiring for the teams in the Southern Cone.
[00:08:50] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely.
So let's start getting into all of these exciting updates that I want to talk to you about. And the first one is the one that just hit my news desk just a few days ago. Maria, she email me, she's like, you're not going to believe this. This is still under embargo. You can't say anything yet. But the. Well now we can. Now we can. Now it's been announced so it's fine.
Of the Walmart population, the population of a muldeer at Cape Forward.
So please tell me more about that. How was this population discovered? What was, was it like technology? Was it camera traps? What was the expedition that found it?
And what does this mean for the species?
[00:09:37] Speaker B: Okay, well first of all I would like to invite people to travel to the southern tip of Chile, continental Chile. So Cape Frog is an area where really the continent ends just before the archipelago systems.
The shores are. So this point is the austral distribution of Humuldir that is an endangered deal with less than 1500 individuals in total for Chile and Argentina and Rewilding Chile, in partnership with Tonkins Conservation and other Chilean philanthropists, are working to promote the creation of a future park, a future national park in Cape Frog.
And for that we have been acquiring land for protection. And the projected park could be around 120,000 hectares. So Wemull has been one of the flagship species for this area because we know that is the southernmost point where the species is present. But it's a quite remote area to be accessed and there is almost no information available of the species that inhabits the area. So in the last two years we have been developing campaigns, expeditions in marine conservation and land conservation to developing inventories of wildlife, flora, fauna and marine species.
So wemull we have been searching, patrolling areas, doing transects, establishing camera traps. And around a year ago, for first time, we were lucky to record one in the coast area of the Cape Frog. The Cape Frog, most of our access we do by boat, boats from the water to the land because there is no roads. There is a single trail for those super adventures. But it's a huge remote area.
So the best way how we can sample the area is to access from the water to the land and establish monitoring points using camera traps and so on. So a year ago a young wemull was recorded in one of the borderline.
It was super tame and the first questions show up. So we say, oh, this huemul comes from a group, from a population, but where are that population? We have been sampling and not recording huemul along the coastline. So we start looking up the mountains and saying, well, the wamules should be at the mid slope at the high portion of the territory of the mountain.
But was super difficult from the coast to reach those areas. So we develop a plan to we make an habitat analysis and we choose some mountain ranges to be explored. So what we planned was to deploy with the support of helicopter and helicopter to deploy teams in some mountain ranges, establishing camp base. And from those camp base we start doing transects, observing the area and establishing camera traps. In one of the first flights that we did just to establish the campsite, we had the first site of one wamul. So it was the best sign. So we were super happy with the imagine we were almost landing and there were our mool waiting for us. So was the best sign, you are doing the right thing here.
[00:13:43] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:13:44] Speaker B: So we land there, we established the campsite and we start, because we start to explore the area, we really felt the first explorers of the area the little birds were. We were the strange creatures of the area. The little birds were chasing us. We were the new creature in that place.
And over the days we start recording where huemules were.
We found in total 10 deer, two different groups in one of the mountain ranges.
We fix around 20 camera traps in that area. And we are just. This is, I would say, the first chapter of the wemull that we are just starting to uncover. So our hope is that in most of the mountain ranges we will find more Wemul groups.
One of the problems of Wemul has is the population is really fragmented, so they have an issue of connectivity. So this is why we are really concerned and thinking how we can not just officially protect this population, but also from the practice, a practical protection of mull and wildlife in general in this area.
[00:15:16] Speaker A: Fantastic. And so what does this discovery mean for the population as a whole? Because I wrote down a national Walmart Corridor project. Is that. So how does this fit into that? And also with the root of the parks? Like, are there a lot of populations throughout the area? And if so, what is the current plan to connect the populations? Is it the actual root of parks? Or is there more behind the scenes that's going on to try to help with the fragmentation?
[00:15:54] Speaker B: Well, I think that all those concepts are in some way connected. So first, the National Wemull Corridor is an initiative that Rewilding is developing with the Chilean state that have many topics to be covered. The major goal is the recovery of Weimur, so is the improving of their conservation status. But of course we face different challenges depending on the areas that we are working in. Cape Frog. One challenge is the lack of information because we know that there is WEMULL there, but we are just now recording the first areas where the WEMULL is present and to produce the first estimation and numbers of the species in this area. So our primary goal there is to identify where these subpopulations of Wamool are occupying the pattern of the land that they are using.
So we can really project what else we can do to improve their condition. Okay, this is the first step. So here the National Weimull Corridor is in total symphony with the promotion of the creation of the Cape Frog National Park. Because the creation of a national park is the first step to designate official protection for all the ecosystems that are present in that land. So this is one step. The other is that this is just the first step because we just explore two mountain ranges and there are at least 20 more. So imagine padding scale all the work that still needs to be done and we are just talking on wemull, we already found other endangered species in the area, in the coastline, for instance, the southern river otter, which is also an endangered species. And again we are starting building the maps of presence and occurrence of the species in the area. So we are really, we felt that we are really discoverers, explorers of the area because there are no real bibliography that you can search and say oh, what these species we will find there. We are really generating the first inventory of the wildlife that are present in this area. For Wemour, the challenge is to understand the hotspots where the species is present and identify natural corridors that connect, let's say the Weimull populations of Cape Frugal with others that are located in the same Brunswick peninsula that is for instance, to the north of this area there is the Laguna Parillar Natural Reserve managed by the Park Service by Conaf.
And so we really need to understand how we can promote the connectivity of huemules of Cape Trower with the Laguna Pariar. And of course if we are able to add public land for conservation, where mules are present is a good option.
And how this is connected with the route of parks. Well, the route of parks is a long route that connect 17 national parks. Cape Frog eventually will be the 18th park in this route. And of course the parks, the national parks, they have the mission in terms to conserve and preserve the ecosystems and the interactions of the species, but also a space for people to enjoy, to develop active touristic activities and also a space where local communities could be proud and have an identity with that land. So this is how the root of parks, the national Wemull corridor and the creation of the future Cape Frog national park are connected. Is really a dream that is becoming true just with the findings. It's like that for me is it's quite evident that the best decision for this treasure is to become a national park. And of course with a plan for public use already the park or the proposed area for the park has public use because there are public land that is already open for public. So we are really thinking, not just in the extreme, conservation, putting a lock and nobody could be there. It's just the opposite. We just need to promote a good tourism, a regulated tourism and be able to see how beautiful is all this land.
[00:21:31] Speaker A: Absolutely. I can first say first testament here that it's so freaking gorgeous. It is absolutely beautiful. The entire length of the rood of parks is so beautiful. And I was the southern river otter. That is so exciting. So when I was in Potomont Puerto Valares area, I had the opportunity to meet Fundacion Legado Chile and talk about how their big project of conserving the HUA or southern river otter and the Moyin river basin and the 85 km of the entire river.
I don't, I don't even know like super, super small number of otters are in the entire river basin. So the fact you found them at Cape Forward, like that's so exciting. I didn't even know that. That is like. That's wonderful.
[00:22:22] Speaker B: Yeah. No, it's like imagine is a land where we have southern river otters, huemules and in the sea there's dolphins, albatrosses. So it's a really unique place. Wales, the humpback whales and so it's fantastic. This is why we really believe that it's just a matter of time the creation of the national park. So it's clear that is the best decision for the land. It's just a process that take time, but sooner or later it will happen.
[00:23:01] Speaker A: Is there a current timeline? Because I know when I talked to Gabby there was a timeline at that time, like, you know, that was established for that time. Is there an updated timeline when you think it will be officially denoted as a national park?
[00:23:17] Speaker B: Well, always is difficult to.
You can have your own timeline, but as your timeline depends in this case always. The decision behind the creation of a national park is a political act, of course that is supported by technical reports and a lot of bureaucracy behind which is natural in all parts of the world.
Those times are difficult to predict, but at least there is people are happy.
The current Chilean authority, the President Borich, he's happy with the idea to create the park.
We hope that he finished his mandate next year in March. So we are really in short time to really advance. But since he start to be a president, the foundation Chris Tompkins Carolina Morgado they approach the President with the proposal of the creation of the Cape Frog. And this is something that we do with all the presidents of Chile.
So it's a permanent process that we share our proposal of creation of parks and of course, because this is a public private Panettip and we really believe that the only way is that the presidents are involved and understand the importance of this area. So this is why for us, yeah, it's our hope.
We can really. Our hope is that in this current mandate of President Borich we can really advance. But it's hard to be really sure about that.
But we hope that that will be the case we have been working for that at least.
[00:25:16] Speaker A: Absolutely. There's so many factors outside of our control. You just hope for the best and keep moving forward and finding more and more reasons this land needs to be protected. We found two highly endangered species already in this park.
Exactly, yeah. And I know that the Magellan Strait there is beautiful and phenomenal and it's like full of kelp forests and just a very important and ecologically rich sea there.
So have you had some, has your team had some chances to do a lot of like exploratory dives to see what is underneath the water surface? And if so, have there been any discoveries along the end? We're talking about the land of the, you know, the coastline and the land. But what about the sea? Is there, what have you found there?
[00:26:06] Speaker B: Yeah, that is a super good question.
There is a team of rewilding Chile really focus on the marine conservation developing as we have been doing in the terrestrial component, sampling the zooplankton, the phytoplankton, the marine mammals, the environmental DNA and so on. So I'm not the best person to give in detail about that. But as we are sampling the land in terms of terrestrial, the flora, the fauna, there is a reforestation program also that they are sampling the capacity of the peatlands to store carbon. They are measuring the carbon that those peatlands had in Cape Frog. So there are really many groups working in parallel with the best experts on the matter. So as a veterinarian, I'm not really expert on the marine component. But of course the marine is rich. The kelp forest are those forests described by Darwin in their exploration with the beagle on the journey in the Southern cone and is really in process to be described all the species that are present there. So we talk about the southern river otter, but also there is a marine otter living there.
And so there is plenty of work that is still. We are in process. The area is huge. It's not of easy access. We really access mostly by water.
So we have been advancing to give very good reasons to promote the creation of the park, if that creation happens, let's say soon.
We will keep working and generating baseline information for this part because that is as critical we really know understand what we are protecting.
So this is a crucial step in the process of the creation of a new protected area.
[00:28:37] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. Because even when you think about it big picture, you know, you, you can't manage what you don't know, you know. But if you have an idea like have you found that this there Is like a really important migration highway or like, you know, migration route that wildlife takes in this area. Or it seems that the one will deer like have an affinity to this area or they, the, you know, the doe, the females, they have their calves in this area or something like that. Then, then you know, like okay, maybe we can put trails here or maybe there could be a campsite here, but not here. And so yeah, I'm really grateful you went through all of that because it's more than just presence or absence. It's how, how animals and wildlife actually using this area or even when it comes to the sea, like the Magellan Strait there, like how are marine mammals moving through it? You know, like what, what areas, how close do they stay to the shore? Do we need to have like, you know, no boating zones or stuff like that? So yeah, that's why I'm so grateful to sit down with you today to just really peel back the layers and like, okay, let's understand not only what's here, but how it's going to affect the future management of the park as things get rolling.
[00:29:57] Speaker B: Yeah, as you said, if the creation of the park happens tomorrow, if we count with that baseline, we know how is on time.
The conservation subjects are over the time, are they in better condition? Are they keeping steady, stable, not changing that much or they are decreasing. So that is why it's important this baseline effort. And we are doing it take a little time. Of course, because it's a huge area, many kilometers of coastline, the land is not easy to advance.
So we have dense forests, we have peatlands, we have the Guayteca cypress. Super unique of this area. It's the southernmost coniferous that inhabits the Americas.
So yeah, we are really trying to put all this together to promote the creation of this national park, even amongst the Chileans. Imagine that for most of Chileans is a territory that is far away, super difficult to imagine. So we are really as important is to generate baseline information.
It's important to promote awareness, to share information on the social media so people, the society can really be aware about what is there. This is why we are super happy with the news of the findings of the WEMULL groups over there. Because we are in a daily routine receiving bad news.
So people are really happy when good news show up in the social media.
And I think that conservation and rewilding is always challenging and we need to be optimistic. It's the only way how we can move forward. If not maybe the information is like that. Oh, there is not much that we can do that is not at least what we believe. And this is why we keep working hard to create parks, to save land, to protect wildlife species, to connect people with nature. Which is basic when we talk about rewilding. So when we talk about rewilding, it's not just a land, a place that is far away from me, but it's what you can do, how you can reconnect with the land, with the wildlife and what you can do where you are, even if you are in a city, in a town you can do. Your behavior, the things that you do had an impact on a much wider effect.
[00:33:02] Speaker A: Yes, I could not agree more. I have that exact same sentiment. And why, I mean the whole point of why rebootology exists too. It's like to share the, the front lines like people like you who are doing the work, who are, you know, seeing the light at the end of the tunnel and doing the sharing this news with us. You know, like when this was shared with me like this big mama story, I was like, oh my gosh, this is exactly what we need right now. This is what all of us need to hear. This is so exciting.
And yeah, yeah, I'm very happy the chat about all of this and I. So I think the perfect segue here is so I saw the wamul, my first one on the Southern Astral highway on my way to Patagonia national park. And I was there right at the end of April slash May. So winter was really starting to set in like going to through CER Castillo and yeah, I mean we're going through like blizzards and stuff, but that is where I saw my first wamul and so going to this location now. So I was there to meet your amazing teammate Alejandra and see the Darwin's Rhea breeding center.
And ever since then, as I'm sure there's been a lot that's happened since I saw her her and Emiliana and had a chance to talk to her and see the chicks. So what's the update there? Have you released more chicks? How's the population doing?
What's the up and up with the darw Rhea or Nandu in the area?
[00:34:41] Speaker B: Well, there is always good news and a lot of work of a teamwork, a committed team on the ground.
We are happy as in this last season we accomplished some things that for long time we were planning the first we developed with our Argentine colleagues ibanational translocation of wild Rios from Argentina to Chile.
So that was a major step and for us a kind of A highlight, because imagine when you are able to make that two countries work together to improve the population status of one species. So from the border point of view, always we see borders as points of separation of division. In this case, we are seeing the border as an encounter point of work. And to put together the force of teams in Argentina with teams in Chile. So basically what we did was to translocate wild rias that were captured. First they came from a wild and healthy population in Argentina. They were enclosed in quarantine for about a month.
And later they were tested for avian flu. With a lot of paperwork behind. And imagine.
And then the logistics came. So the trucks to transport and we transport 15 RIAs from Argentina to Chile, specifically to the pens and the infrastructure of Rewilding Chile in Patagonia National Park. Those birds arrived there in good condition.
They were there for acclimation for about a month, for quarantine as well. They were sampled for avian flu. Again, the group were composed by adult birds and juveniles. In two of the adults we put GPS collars to monitor their performance in the wild. They were released.
Now they are living out with the wild rheas on a weekly basis. Our team in the field, they are recovering data from those birds release.
In parallel with that, we have a Chilean collaborator, Reserva Kiman, where we have a breeding center and they provide us. They support us with adults and rea chicks.
In this season we release also in addition to the Argentine birds. We release Chilean birds kept in captivity. Again, adult birds with GPS collars.
They are doing well.
We release about 60 birds in total.
The mortality has been pretty low, which is good, always is part of the game.
We are releasing birds where natural predators leaves. We have pumas, we have Culpeo foxes, which are the main predators in this case.
But we keep working well in terms that the population trend of Darwin's Rhea is keep with a trend of increase, which is our primary purpose.
Our goal is to reach 100 birds of mature birds. We are still. We are not getting that point because we had the predation effect, which there is no way to control. It's part of the rules of the area, but has been a super successful case, I would say of partnership. So we are not working alone as Rewilding Chile. We are working with our partners in Argentina. We are working with the Reserva Command. So there is more and more organizations and people who are taking part on this effort.
Also we receive internship students who support us in the incubation process. Artificial and natural incubation in the care of the birds and later on in the monitoring in the field. So we are really proud on the results and the models that we have develop with Darwin's Rhea.
[00:39:39] Speaker A: Wow, that is so exciting. So you just hit on like two big updates since I had the opportunity to meet Alejandro and Emiliano and that was they were well aware that genetic diversity was going to be a big issue. So that translocation of Darwin's Ria from Argentina to Chile, that's huge. So that like hit that really big issue that was already identified is to.
Because I think at the time there was just like the breakaway ones that you had that only lasted a few days and then after that, then that. So there's all this like blank lifestyle or like, you know, lifetime after that that just other than observation, you just didn't have. And so. Wow. So it sounds like Alejandra's dream came true. That was like her big future goal for the project was to get GPS collars on the birds. So has it been long enough? Are you collecting any data yet or is it too early to have any conclusions of anything?
[00:40:42] Speaker B: Well, in a weekly basis we are collecting data on the field from the GPS collars. We already had a. We have a good sense on how the birds were gradually increasing their home ranges inside the park. They had been covered a range of between 6,000 hectares to almost 10,000 per bird. There is a lot of extrapolation in terms of more than extrapolation of overlapping of the home ranges. And we also had the case that the Argentine birds, they were in Chile and some of the Chilean birds that we released, they explored into Argentina and they come back.
[00:41:30] Speaker A: That's awesome.
[00:41:31] Speaker B: Which is great. It's part of. Let's say that the birds are just reaffirming what we know from the biological point of view, that there is no barriers or frontiers.
The administrative frontiers or borders are human things that we agree with.
But finally, wildlife, they don't know or they don't understand about frontiers. And this is why we hope that in the medium or long term we can officially protect the Argentine portion. It will be a dream in terms of an ecosystem integrity of all this land. Not just thinking on Rigas, but thinking on ambient condors, on pumas, on small cats like the Pampas cat or the Geoffroy scat that also inhabits in this area.
[00:42:27] Speaker A: Well, that was the perfect segue because the next species I wanted to ask you about was the condors, the Indian condor.
Perfect.
So since, yeah, last April when I was there, has there been any exciting updates for The Andean condor program. And actually, I did not have a chance to speak to any of your team about it. So if you want to give a little bit of backstory about it too, that would be awesome.
[00:42:51] Speaker B: Totally. Well, as Rewilding Chile, we work in close partnership with Manco Project, which is an initiative led by the Chilean Ornithologists Union.
They manage a raptor rehabilitation center nearby Santiago, and they are the reference center for Andean condor. So all the condors that are rescued in Chile, they end up in the center there.
And every two years we receive condors to be prepared to be released into the wild in Patagonia National Park.
This partnership, what means as rewild in Chile, we are in charge of the last leg of a long process science.
A young bird is rescued by someone. Because the trouble with condors, first of all, is that they are birds of very slow development.
So it's super common that very young birds are rescued by people. And that bird is impossible to be immediately to be released back in nature. If that is the case, it will be dead very soon because it's highly dependent on the learning process and what the mom and the dad could teach them in terms of how to fly, where to fly, where to rest, how to behave with other condors. So there is a very strong social component behind condor development.
So this is why these young condors, they stay in captivity with other condors in the Rapture center for usually at least a year and in some case two years. So once they are really well developed from the physical condition, they are healthy from the behavior aspect, because the idea is that they are not dependent on a human.
They are not imprinted with people. They just behave as a condor should behave.
And in the center they say, okay, these condors are ready. We organize a transportation of a group of condors, usually two or three birds, to Patagonia Park. These birds previously are medically and healthy. Sheik and the vets, they say, okay, these birds are ready. And they arrive into the park where we feed satellite transmitters and they stay in an automation pen for two months.
In those pens, the idea is that they anchor the bird to that land, to that place, and they receive food, but always by someone who they never associated food with people.
It's done by night, when they can't see and never showing that someone appearing there to show that we are providing meat or dead carcass. There they learn how to fly. There they make exercise and even they interact with y condors.
Right now we have four condors that we are monitoring they are already released, they are doing well in. They are moving between Argentina and Chile. They are showing up the main routes and areas that they use. And we have been preparing to receive another three condors next September to be released in December. So that is our plan for this year for the condors. And as I said, there is a lot of work behind the rescue of these birds.
Volunteers in the Raptor rehabilitation center, veterinarians at the Metropolitan Zoo, who are in charge to check the health status of the birds and so on.
As rewilding Chile. We are in the phase of acclimation and the monitoring of the birds once they are released, which again is a gradual process. It doesn't mean that once the pen is open they just fly away because they really need to learn how to fly in nature, which is never easy. And most important, they should behave with other wild condors. The only way how these condors could survive is that if they can interact with other condors because they are a super coperative species, a gregarious species that really depends to search for food, to rest if they do in group, not alone.
[00:47:52] Speaker A: Yeah, that makes total sense because actually the first species that welcomed me because I started my amazing trip in Torres and the first animals that I saw were Indian condors soaring. And I'm just like, is this not the best welcome to Patagonia that I could have ever had? And it was three. It was three condors. And the. And then, yeah, from then on out, I never saw a solitary condor. It was at least two, if not more together. So that makes total sense. So for them to acclimate and like learn how to be a wild condor and you know, a part of their neighborhood. So that makes total sense.
[00:48:30] Speaker B: No, totally. And. And they are complex from the social point of view. This is why special care is taken with these young birds. And it's really a long process. It's impossible to make it shorter. It's time consuming. And why we do people ask why you do if there are wild condors? Well, because every condor is important.
Condors have a very long lifespan. They could live in captivity for there are records of 70 and even 80 years. Imagine, impossible to have all those birds in captivity. So every bird who had a chance to come back to nature, we made the effort to give them that chance. And we feel that that is really important.
And the condor is a vulnerable species. So still we are really working with a species that is there, is healthy by fortune in Argentina and Chile, but is really in bad shape in the northern Andes. Let's Say Colombia, Venezuela, they have very low numbers of condors. And it's even a rewilding strategy that in the close future we can eventually send condors to other countries to advance to recover populations of those countries as well.
[00:49:57] Speaker A: That would be incredible. Oh my gosh. Yeah. Condors are such an important part of the life cycle of an ecosystem.
Yeah. Especially since they're so long lived. Is there any other in that part of the Patagonia national park and South. Are there any other updates of anything that have happened?
[00:50:17] Speaker B: Well, the other that we have been working is on the pumas. Pumas in this area was a species that for long time was chased away, was killed because was the main cause of death, especially sheep ranching operations.
There was a huge controversy when we start promoting the creation of Patagonia National Park.
But over time the part has been. Astores del Paine is gradually becoming a magnet for people who wants to see wildlife. And puma is always a species that everyone wants to see.
That means an opportunity, but always a risk. A risk in terms of bad practice, the need of regulation. And to promote ethic and responsible tourism, we are organizing a workshop in October, October to talk with experts of South Africa, of the US Of Pantanal, on the ethics and lessons learned on the management and tourism with wild carnivores, with wild felines like jaguars in Pantanal, with leopards in South Africa, and with pumas and bears in the U.S. so we really feel that it's super important to learn from the practical lessons.
You can accelerate process if you learn from the lessons that others learned before. It's like that you don't need to repeat mistakes and you can of course adapt the learning of other places to your reality. And this is what we hope with this puma workshop that will take place in Magallanes, in Puerto Natales. And the idea is to involve the Park Service, private landowners of Ranching, other NGOs that are also working with pumas, like Panthera, and really discuss and promote this process that is already on place on how we can be responsible with puma tourists, how we can do better, improve. Because sometimes there are bad practice that finally what they do is put in risk. The wildlife and people, of course, as well. So we need really to be proactive and not wait an accident to happen to make something. So this is, I would say, our effort in terms of puma in Patagonia. We have been evaluating the interaction of pumas and the touristic use along the trails. And it's something that we are putting in the table discussing with the park authority and say, look, it's important to work with signs. To tell people that pumas are around is not to become really scared about that, but really to be responsible. If I'm with kids in the park, I should be responsible with the kids that are in charge. Are simple things. Because if an accident happens at some point, nobody wants an accident. Not for people, not for. For pumas. It will be bad for all. Point of view.
[00:54:01] Speaker A: Oh, that's so exciting. Yes. I'm working very closely with Nico from Panthera down in Poza Natalia. He was the star of episode two of the Patagonia series. And I'm going to be hopefully running a big fundraiser for the Blinka project to help ranchers coexist more with pumas and scare them off their land in a non lethal way. So. And he was telling me a lot about that. There's that big conversation right now happening about more regulations and stuff so that pumas and humans can be protected. So it's just so I just, I love our community. I love hearing it from all different sides and I know that Jim Williams, who is the author of Path of the Puma so Rewatologies Book Club, we read that book in conjunction with the Patagonia series and we just sat down with him for a book club meeting and so he is amazing. I know he'll be at that conversation, no doubt, with all of his experience.
[00:55:07] Speaker B: Well, Jim, Jim is coming for the workshop. Jim is one of the invited speakers from the us the other is Fernando Tortato from Pantera, Brazil, from Pantanal.
And the other is less Carlized from South Africa who works for many years in some conservation projects and beyond the initiatives in South Africa and in other African countries. So we really hope to collaborate with the process here. There is no one way or one way to do the right thing is really complex and you really need to balance interests.
And this is why we feel that it's important the practical experience of other places to hear good and bad experience because it's the only way how we can anticipate or reduce the chance of failure from our side.
[00:56:14] Speaker A: Oh, it's so, so smart. So smart. Like all those areas I've been to the Pantanal I've been to, I've been all over Africa.
And then yeah, meeting Jim personally. Yeah, like that is.
That's a strong crew. Like I have full faith.
And also meeting Nico, like I have full faith you all will figure it out. Like that is. That is a crew. Like those are very well Respected, honorable, people who know what they're talking about and imagine.
[00:56:44] Speaker B: And plus all the experience of people who have been working in Marianas, the people of the Torres del Paine national park, the neighbors of the park, like Estancia Leona Marga, the Goits family, the Cerrogido Conservation Pantera. So we really hope to put over the table and produce the best of everyone to make things better for Pumas, for people, for tourists, tourists, for the parks and for the future.
[00:57:21] Speaker A: Yes, that's so exciting, speaking to my heart. But big cats are my love. So I saw Famous for Pesto when I was down there.
[00:57:28] Speaker B: I know, I can see behind you.
[00:57:31] Speaker A: I only have one more big cat to go, Kristen. Just one more. I have snow leopards. They're the last on my list. And then starting that long journey of all the small cats, I don't know, that'll probably take the rest of my life to accomplish that one, if that's even accomplishable with how elusive a lot of the species are.
But okay. So the last park that I got to see along the route of parks is Pumalin. And I was wondering, is there any updates from that area by chance?
[00:58:01] Speaker B: Yeah, well, there is always updates and news in all places in Pumalin from the wildlife perspective. We have been working in three species.
One, we developed some in the summer like we did in Cape Frog. We did the Eli Weimull. So we were exploring some high portions of Pumalin for first time to record if there are huemul groups inside the Patagonia. Sorry. Inside Puvalin national park, we deploy camera traps in the expeditions. We didn't record the species yet again. The park is huge, always 400,000 hectares. We choose some mountain ranges that had characteristics that were good for Wemull.
We planned in the last three months of this year to recover those camera traps and we really hope to record Huemules at least in the time that we were fixing the camera traps, we didn't record tracks or WEMULL activity. But let's see.
We have our hope in those cameras.
The other two species that we were working, one is the Darweez frog, is an endangered species as well. It's an amphibian that lives in the forest.
Pumalin is a treasure from the amphibian point of view. It has a high diversity of species. So we have been working with a group of herpetologists describing the species that are present in Pumalin, sampling for fungal disease. Keytrudiomycosis, we say in Spanish.
So it's this Fungus that has a world distribution. It is associated with the decline, the global decline of amphibians and associated with climate change by Fortune. The presence of fungus is really low. Not in the Darwin's frog, which is our good news.
And we are also marking some of the amphibians which the basic biology is not well described. We are really from Pumalin. Our hope is to spread this work to other parks. Along the route of parks. Amphibians, as they are quite small, they are sometimes underestimated on their importance.
They are super good indicators of the health of ecosystems.
We are super glad that we are working in this partnership with a network of herpetologists of the Academy, with Chilean experts and we are really expanding this work is the first, let's say our first steps in the world of amphibians.
And we are really glad with this. Of course, it's a partnership again with the Chilean Park Service.
And yeah, this is eventually we are exploring the need of a local breeding center for Darwin's rhea, for Darwin's frog. Sorry, the Darwin's.
[01:01:43] Speaker A: The Darwin frog.
[01:01:43] Speaker B: Darwin's all around for the Darwin's frog in the area.
And the third species that we have been working in Pumalin recently has been pudu. Pudu is one of the smallest deer in the Americas.
It's just the really, really small is the pudu Mephistopheles that is up north in Peru, Olivia.
And this southern pudu is really abundant in Pumalin Park. And we are evaluating the presence of pudu inside the park and in the buffer zone of the park. We are really aware on what is happening with the pudu in the buffer zone. Pudu are super vulnerable to example dog attacks. They are super vulnerable to that. And it's something that we are really concerned. The other threat is the.
When they reach the Carretera Austral, the southern highway, they are hit by cars. So we are working how we can prevent that with signs along the road and also to count with a small space where puddles, when they are rescued, they can really be managed for a while to be release later on once they are recovered. So these are our actions in the wildlife component in Pumalin. So wemull at the highland and in the forest, the amphibians with the Darwin's frog at the top and the other amphibians and pudu.
[01:03:29] Speaker A: Wow, you have your hands full, don't you?
[01:03:34] Speaker B: Yeah, by Fortune. We are a team of people and we have these collaborators from the academy students.
The Chilean Park Service is really a cooperative work. It's the Only way how we can be spreading the territory, working in so many places and with so many wildlife species.
[01:03:59] Speaker A: Wow.
Well, those were all of my questions today, Cristian. That was so, so good. And so I would love just if you have any last closing comments that you would love to share with everybody and how they can keep up with your work and rewading Chile's work and all of these exciting updates. So anything that you would like to share with us?
[01:04:20] Speaker B: Yeah, for sure.
I would like to invite everyone to follow us in the social media on the work of rewilding Chile.
Thus we have been working in Patagonia primarily, but we are really aware of the need to spread the impact of our work along the Andes, along the country, not just the southern portion. And by fortune, we have been working with other groups around Santiago, for instance, for recovery of Guanaco.
And it's something that we are really is part of our mission and it's something that we are internally discussing. And the only way how we can really have more impact is to work in network with other groups, with other local groups, with the academy, with the community.
And it's the model that there is no magical receipt to be successful. But we believe in collaboration, in partnership. The public component is something critical is the only way how we can, with a long term perspective to keep working.
I invite you to follow our work, to support in the way that you can do, spreading the word, et cetera. So there are many ways how you can support our work and not just our work, but the work that other rewilders are doing along the world. So we are so many and there is plenty to be done and accomplished.
We are still in time to do and this is what is our mission and what we are really committed today.
[01:06:16] Speaker A: Oh my goodness, absolutely. And I hope to sit down with more and more rewilders from around the world and share these amazing stories. But again, Kirillan, this was so good. I had so much fun chatting with you and I can't wait to share your story with everybody and these exciting updates that have happened since our time.
[01:06:36] Speaker B: Yeah, no thank you. Brooke has been a pleasure and we are ready for for another conversation in the close future to share more news and updates on what we have been doing.
[01:06:54] Speaker A: Well, that was incredible, Christian, thank you so much for taking the time to share all of these amazing updates with us. Seriously, the helicopter Walmart Discovery alone had me on the edge of my seat and I already knew the story. Story.
Ah, so good.
For those of you who are now totally hooked on these patagonia Conservation stories Definitely go back and listen to the full where the Wild Calls series if you haven't already.
It's eight episodes of pure adventure and conservation goodness that'll give you the complete picture of this remarkable place.
And hey, if you're sitting there thinking, I need to see this for myself, we still have spots open for the April 2026 expedition I mentioned at the beginning of the episode. We'll be tracking pumas, meeting researchers like Nicolagos, and exploring the exact places we've been talking about today.
Plus, a portion of the trip cost goes directly to supporting Panthera's Puma research. So you're funding conservation while having the adventure of a lifetime.
Speaking of supporting this work, we're also running a fundraising campaign for Panthera's groundbreaking Blinka Puma Go Existence project, and we would love it if you helped us reach our $20,000 goal.
You can find all the details about the trip, the fundraiser, and the full podcast
[email protected] Project Patagonia thanks again to Krysty Ahn and Rewilding Chile for these updates, and thanks to all of you for listening.
Until next time, keep exploring and I'll catch you on the next adventure.
